Sit Down, Breathe a Bit

It’s too much the ninth time I feel someone else’s sweat on my back, and I turn to leave. I think to cut a line through the crowd, sharp with intention. Instead, I stagger half-steps into the mosh. Thump-thump, locked knees. Movement ripples across bodies and through mine, and I reel. (No sea legs.) I’m drowning in waters stirred by music: boiling sound waves. A glimmer in the distance like sun through a sea-storm. One step, two, three, thirty, and I’m at the stairs with a hand on the railing.

Hauling myself off the dance floor I feel something pop, but being able to breathe again is worth it. I straighten, ignoring the fact that I’m thinking more in image-concept-feeling than word-phrase-sentence. Something about the fog machines? (Foremast cuts through the murk.) Our table approaches at a stilted pace, and Maia goes to help me into my seat. I wave her off; she complies. She yells, and I gesture to my seventy-cent ear plugs from Walmart. She leans in close enough that my ear lobe buzzes to the vibrations of her voice. Over the unrelenting bass, her words sound like thoughts placed in my head.

Gracie! Are you okay?

Yes, of course I’m okay.

Are you sure?

Yes, I’m sure, what is she on about? She points at my leg, and I notice the thrum of pain radiating from my ankle. It must’ve been hiding beneath the music.

What?

Nothing. Maia nods, and looks out over the dance floor.

You ready to go? Yes, please. I’ll get Shawn.

She turns to go into the pit and I let her. I’m lying back in my chair like a recliner. The roiling of the mob has a sort of logic to it, taken at a distance. Pockets of countervailing motion that merge and mingle into an indistinct whole. I let myself get lost in it for a bit. As my eyes drift closed, the alcohol wraps its warm arms around me, and the world begins to sway. First it is a gentle rocking that beats in broad strokes, but eventually I am tumbling through space. (Dancer on the weather deck.) 

My skin prickles. It is warm and humid, but I am allergic to being seen.

My eyes open, and the dream ends. It’s been too long; I knew Maia would need me, but in the pit I am a lost thing. I stand, reveling in the empty feeling in my legs like I’ve had a good workout. Unappealing it may seem, but the dance floor beckons.

The first steps are like floating. Something about the air is different now. The fog has settled into a level haze, and laser lights set it twinkling. I search for a lifeline; peer as I might, none emerges. I try to squint the mist away.

At the stairs my lungs spasm: a burst of air through my pharynx. I take the railing back in hand, set to brave the deep unknown. (Unprepared argonaut.) Step one is painless, as is step three. I ignore the rest, and give myself to the crowd.

Shawn! I call, shoulders and hips buffeting me like nothing. Shawn! Maia! Not even the bodies pressed against me turn. I blink, and there are horns and hides scattered among the dancers. I breathe, and ash is coating my skin. Something murmurs through the veil.

One foot hits the ground, and the world turns with a crack. (Overboard.)

. . . . .

I wake in a breath.

I writhe to escape from underfoot; I crane my neck, desperate for a way up. I am still. Unable. Impotent. My fingers seize up, and release. Seize, and release. My head is wet.

I put a pin in trying to move and take in the room as best I can. The club is silent, and dark but for slashes of color and white that rend fog and flesh alike. The people are dead-still. The nearest ones look at me with mild concern. The others stand straight and tall. I resolve myself to focus on the one-two, one-two-three-four of my breathing.

A presence fills the room like breath. When it sees me, I do my best to cease entirely. It approaches, and I am a deer flailing against a snare. (Mind against body.) When it reaches my little hollow, it waits, patiently withholding judgment. Then, when I am still, it spreads over and through me. I try to beg; when that fails, I try to whimper. In the end, all I can muster is a thin wheeze. It’s hard to breathe when I’m trembling so violently.

Trembling. A revolt of the unconscious mind against my paresis. Sweat – something thicker? – jittering off my brows. I feel a weight pulling my eyelids closed by the lashes. As the darkness descends, words force themselves into shape in my mind.

Who are you?

I am nobody.

What are you?

Human, I think.

What do you will?

How the fuck do I answer that.

The ground swells and contracts, rustling like a cosmic sigh. A waste.

My blood boils, but I have nothing to say.

Are you not angry? I inhale, exhale. Wheeze. Then go. Be. Show us that you are, and that you are not alone.

. . . . .

I wake in a breath.

There is a hole of people on the dance floor. (Mundane maelstrom.) A few of them guide me back onto my feet. I let them. They watch me: sympathetic, but wary, as if I am an animal that has made its way inside of the club. I sway a moment, just to see their eyes widen. Maia, standing by the table with Shawn, catches my attention. She beckons with a twitch of her head. I comply.

She winces at my limp, and I look away. Settle my gaze in the pit, where an afterimage of my blood and spinal fluid is still fading. Something is missing… I bring a hand to the outside of my ear canal, where it finds only empty space. I’m out a dollar forty. My head is pounding.

Maia gives me a cautious look. You all right? Shrug. Do you need a hand? Shrug. …Can I give you a hand?

I look at her face, and then the table. I nod.

She tucks herself under my arm as Shawn helps me balance. We make our way to the door in quarter-steps, then half-steps, and finally at pace. Into the cool night air, rocking our way over the sidewalk and the street until I’m laying across the back of Maia’s Honda flying home, eyes closed, letting the sound of their voices sink into my bones.